The Writing Life

Authors have a tough time than most artistic people. Painters can express themselves more easily on a canvas and bring a scene to life through beautiful and vibrant colours. Comic book artists also have it easy as they can draw an already well-established character or one of their own creations and be noticed. Now that's not to say that these people didn't train or work hard at their trades to get where they are and be recognised for their talents. But let's face it, they don't have to work nearly as hard as writers to be noticed.

              In today's market, writers face extremely tough competition and have to strive to be better than the rest. Of course there's a lot of rubbish being published at the moment both through mainstream publishing and also self-publishing but the ones with real talent are being lost amongst the crowd. Before these writers used to shine like a diamond in the rough but nowadays literary agents only seem interested in stories about celebrities who won reality TV shows and/or women (and dare I say it even men) who slept with famous footballers or footballing icons who bedded prostitutes old enough to be their grannies. 

             So, my question to you is, what do writers have to do today to stand out and be that something extra special that nabs them a literary agent or publisher? Do we really need to have thousands of Twitter followers and 2000 friends on Facebook to be published? Is having a unique, interesting plot, well developed characters and excellent prose not enough any more? Leave your thoughts below.

Have a great weekend, guys!